Mattie Mae Thomas - Dessie (great reads txt) 📗

to be Mark. The three of them were laughing and playing. She called for them to come over to her side of the stream. Mattie quickly jumped across then looked back at Mark. He just shook his head and said, “I can’t.” Then Mattie looked sad and jumped back to the other side of the fence. She motioned for Brie to follow her. Again and again she tried to jump across. Something was holding her back. She would leap for the other side, only to land back where she started.
They watched her try to cross, and then the twins looked over their shoulder as if listening to someone talk. Turning back Mattie had tears in her eyes. “They won’t let you come. You don’t belong here.” She looked at Mark then back to Brie. “You have to find another way. Please find another way.”
Then she was all along. “Wait! Please wait for me!” she yelled, hoping they could hear her.
“Hurry Brie! You have to hurry.” Mattie’s voice echoed from the darkness that was closing in on Brie.
Over and over she had the dream. It never changed, always ending with Mattie telling her to hurry. At dawn she finally gave up on sleep. She decided maybe a walk would help. She steps lead her to the little grave yard in the woods between her house and Grace’s. Mattie’s grave had fresh flower. She sat there while the sun rose and started to warm the new day. She replayed the dream over again for the hundredth time, only to find no answers. Frustrated she said allowed, “Come on Mattie, help me out here.”
“You talk to Aunt Mattie, too?”
Brie was startled, she thought she was along. She gave the little girl a smile. “Hello, Mattie Mae.”
“Do I know you? I think I do. But I can’t remember your name.” Mattie Mae watched Brie. “I have seen you before. You were at the hospital.”
“That’s right. I’m Brie Holland, I work there. I also live across the woods,” she pointed back towards her house. “I rent the house from your grandparents.”
That was good enough to calm Mattie Mae’s fears. She came to Brie’s side to look down at the headstone.
“I come here every day,” she said. “I talk to Aunt Mattie all the time.”
“I find that it helps to talk to people. I do it all the time.” Brie said gently.
Mattie Mae smiled at Brie. She liked her. It was like she understood, even though she hadn’t told her anything. “Do you want to come to my house for breakfast? Grandma won’t mind. She says the more people the merrier.”
“I would love too, Mattie Mae. But I’m afraid I have to go to work.” Seeing the sad look on the girl’s face, she quickly added. “Could I come tomorrow instead?”
The smile returned to Mattie Mae’s face. “That would be great. I will tell grandma your coming.”
They both looked up, for in the distance you could hear Grace calling, “Mattie Mae, it is time for your breakfast.”
“I’m coming Grandma.” She yelled back. “I guess I will see you tomorrow. I will meet you here. Is that ok?”
Brie couldn’t help but smile. The little girl had a way of capturing your heart. “It’s a date. I will be here.” She watched as Mattie Mae skipped across the field to her waiting grandmother. The sun sparkled on the polished stone, drawing her attention. “Is this your answer Mattie? Is she the answer of finding my way?” It was like a light had been turned on. “She is the way to Mark.”
***
Brie had one hour she was to work with Mark. After her lunch she went upstairs to his room. There was no change he laid there silent. But he didn’t look restful. His face was drawn. Almost as if he was in pain.
Brie had never tried to help someone in Mark condition before. She had done small things, broken bone, muscle strains, colds. She always had a starting point. A were does it hurt kind of thing. Then she remembered something her father had told her once. “If you don’t know what you are doing than you have to start at the bottom and learn your way up.” So that is what she did. She started at his feet.
Right away, Brie felt a difference. Instead of just a healing energy flowing from her body to her patients, it was an essence of her too. As if she was leaving her body behind. She was being pulled in two directions. Her hands and the healing energy were working their way up Marks legs. Yet she was standing by the stream in her dreams. There was Mark and Mattie, playing as before. Mattie saw her. She held her figure to her lips, signaling Brie to stay silent.
It was like watching movie, except it happened right before your eyes, flashes of memories playing out before her. The twins were very little, five or six maybe. It was cold outside. Snow was on the ground. Mark was running toward the creek.
“No Mark. Mom said to stay away from the ice.” Mattie yelled while running after him.
“I’m not going to get on it. I just want to see.” he looked over his shoulder to yell back. When he turned back around the bank was to close. Trying to stop, he slid down the bank, breaking the ice. He reached his hand out, searching for anything to hold on to. A clump of frozen grass stopped him from going all the way into the water. “Mattieeee!!” he yelled.
Brie jumped up to help. But like in her dream she couldn’t get across. They couldn’t even see her this time.
Mattie tried to get down the bank, only to have more dirt break free to fall on Mark. As Mark tried to pull himself out of the water his feet slipped. Mattie lay on her stomach and reached out to Mark. “Take my hand. I will pull you up.”
Mark reached up to her, while Mattie stretched farther over the crumbling bank. At last their hand met. Mattie pulled with all her might. Mark was out of the water. Then the bank gave away and Mattie went tumbling down. In a blink of an eye their situations were reversed. Mark was on the edge of the stream holding Mattie’s hand pulling her from the water. Her hand was the only thing that wasn’t wet. Her lips were turning blue. Mark yelled and screamed for help while holding Mattie out of the water.
A flash and Brie was in a hospital room. Mattie was in bed and Mark stood by her side. “I’m sorry Mattie. I should be in that bed not you. But I’m going to look after you. I promise.”
Brie was back in Marks hospital room. The small timer was going off, letting her know that the hour was up. She looked down at Mark and gave a sigh. “What are you trying to show me Mattie? What’s keeping him asleep?”
Frustrated from not finding any answers she gathered her thing and left for her next appointment. On the way to the elevator she passed Dr. Lowe.
“Anything?” he asks.
She shook her head. “I will try again tomorrow.”
***


The next day she was up and waiting for Mattie Mae in the grave yard. Grace came with the little girl to assure her that she was welcome for breakfast. She ended up staying the whole morning with them. Mattie Mae chatting away like a magpie. They ate breakfast then baked cookies and cakes for the church bake sale they were putting on that weekend. In no time at all Brie’s watch alarm signaled the time for her to leave for work.
“That’s my cue,” she said.
“Awe, do you have to go? I was going to show you my pictures.” Mattie pointed to a stack of photo albums on the coffee table.
“I have to go to work. Could I come back again tomorrow after work and you show me the photos then?” It was hard to say no to Mattie Mae.
“Can she come again, Grandma? Please, please,” Mattie Mae hopped on her seat with excitement.
Grace smiled and said, “I think that’s a wonderful idea.”
Grace walked with Brie to the door. “I haven’t seen her that way in weeks. Having you around takes her mind off of Mark.”
“She is a darling little girl,” Brie smiled her pleasure. “I enjoy spending time with her.”
“In that case, I invite you to come over anytime you want. I would do anything to help her through all this.” Grace said as she gave a worried look over her shoulder at Mattie Mae.
That was how Brie started to spend all her extra time with the Thomas’. They treated her as part of the family. They even talked her into having a sleep over on the night before the church’s bake sale. She felt as if this was where she belongs. But each time she left them the feeling that time was running out came back stronger.
All week she worked with Mark. It was the same routine. She would set her little timer for one hour. And then lose herself in his memories. Each time it was a different show but always the same results. First, it was Mattie getting sick from falling in the stream. Then, she broke her arm falling from a tree Mark dared her to climb. Stitches came next because Mark said she was to girlie to jump her bike across a ditch. They were all a little memory of the twins playing together, only to have Mattie get hurt and Mark blaming himself.
Frustration ate at Brie. She set in the conference room on Mark’s floor going over her personal note. What was she missing? The patterns of the memories were all the same. But what was she to do with it?
There was a knock on the door then Dr. Lowe poked his head in. “Do you have a minute?”
“Sure. Do you want a cup?” she held up her coffee cup. “I just made it.”
“I would love some. You sit I will get it.” He set at the table and started pulling stack of paper out